Official bitching about Hudson abandoning VC support. [VC/WiiWare = lost cause]
- Thread starter Kobun Heat
- Start date
cartman414
Member
Cosmonaut X said:
CV3 has special chips in both versions of the game (VRC6 in Jap, and MMC5 in US/Eur) that would be needed to be emulated first.
SonicMegaDrive
Member
[Nintex] said:
Say what...? Is this just a wild guess on your part, or is this really rumored?
THAT would most certainly raise my spirits.
SonicMegaDrive
Member
Poo.
I certainly wouldn't get my hopes up. Mario Kart is such a big release, I think Nintendo would actually make some(tiny) effort to advertise it beforehand(like the Metroid Month, last August)
I certainly wouldn't get my hopes up. Mario Kart is such a big release, I think Nintendo would actually make some(tiny) effort to advertise it beforehand(like the Metroid Month, last August)
It's worth discounting when Master System launched with one game. Neo Geo has eight, which might be fine if it had really only been four months--but it hasn't. It's been over half a year.Somnid said:
It doesn't need a great game. It needs a good one or, if it continues along this path of near-perpetual mediocrity, it at least needs to return to sifting through the shovelware three games at a time.
When it comes to home consoles, I've already done that--as far as retail games go, I pretty much despise this generation, everything it's been so far, and everything it's purporting to be in the future. But I'm still complaining about VC, precisely because I'm living off of it; that's all the more incentive to want to see it become much better than it currently is. Given all the new system additions, it could even be better than it was early last year, or around the Wii launch, but right now I'd settle for just the step toward having that level of quality again.
If I were a third-party and saw that I could have my game rated and ready to go (see Shining Force II, Ys Book I & II, Dragon Slayer...), or even released in another region (Mega Man, Mega Man 2), but Nintendo still wouldn't put it up for nine months, I'd be just as hesitant as them to bother putting forth any efforts.
Also, even partially blaming Hudson is ludicrous. They've provided loads of VC games, almost always more than one per month--but always at least one per month, with March's being DoReMi Fantasy. In terms of game library (that is, putting aside the filter that most people around here seem to hate), they've given, fairly literally, the best support they could.
Yes, all of this precisely. While acknowledging that I have very little clue what goes on behind the scenes, I'll say that I wouldn't be surprised if the progression of VC ran like this:SonicMegaDrive said:
Nintendo announces VC and turn out to be a fantastic hardware mover with Wii --> third-parties see potential and jump on board -- > Nintendo and third-parties release games --> Nintendo decides that people will be attracted by the quality and quantity, so they never advertise --> only a select few know about VC --> sales turn out to be lethargic --> third-parties' optimism in the potential of VC wanes --> third-parties don't bother to get as many games working for VC --> Nintendo sees that releasing three games per week is an unsustainable goal due to diminished interest from other publishers --> VC drops to two games released per week --> even people who love VC find themselves not caring --> sales become still more lethargic, speaking relative to the number of games available and the number of Wii owners in existence --> third-parties become still less interested in the service
It's getting exceptionally dangerous at this point, as if it could become an unbreakable cycle. Get on the advertising, Nintendo. :| Do what you wouldn't for Gamecube, and save the VC. It all starts there, if my theory holds.
crowphoenix
Banned
ethelred said:
So, it launched with .5 games then?
cartman414
Member
Yeah, boourns.
Fantasy Zone would have been a far superior launch title.
Then again, Wonder Boy was apparently the SMS' key launch title, similar to how NES had Super Mario Bros. and the PS1 had RIIIIIIIIIIIDGE RACERRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!! Ok, the latter still isn't even out on PSN, but Kaz used it, with aforementioned forced enthusiasm, to show off the d/l service at that infamous E3.
Fantasy Zone would have been a far superior launch title.
Then again, Wonder Boy was apparently the SMS' key launch title, similar to how NES had Super Mario Bros. and the PS1 had RIIIIIIIIIIIDGE RACERRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!! Ok, the latter still isn't even out on PSN, but Kaz used it, with aforementioned forced enthusiasm, to show off the d/l service at that infamous E3.
Jiggy37 said:
It's like you described the life of the Virtual Console so far. And YES it is alarming. I wouldn't be surprised it could go down until the there is no more update to the service. The only thing we would see it Nintendo blabbering something along the lines "the casual gamer didn't seem interest in retro gaming so we simply stopped updating it and focused on what they want" **unveils Wiifit**
Seriously, Nintendo should advertise the service and if they don't think there are needs for that, they should PR the numbers around and show people that it prints money 'cause if that was true the only thing they would want to happen is the get more publishers interested...
Are you kidding? Wii Shop channel is on the front page of the Wii console. Anyone that does cursory exploring of that channel to find out what it is will know what it is. I don't know how much more obvious you can get.SonicMegaDrive said:
Why are some of you acting like VC is a near neglected service? Over ten million VC games have been downloaded up to Dec. 07.
CreatureX3
Member
So because your favorite third party game hasn't appeared on the VC yet, it means that that third party interest in the VC is waning? Oh GAF GAF GAF... :lol :lol
neight said:
Which seems pretty pitiful given the number of games up, the number of consoles sold, and in comparison with, say, Xbox Live Arcade.
And I fully agree with Jiggy and SMD with the need for Nintendo to advertise this service, because its entire promise is in serving as a retro-gaming heaven -- and for a while it was delivering that on a week-to-week basis, but it's fallen so far below that past quality level that it's truly depressing.
Just as a counterpoint, when GameTap launched, its advertising program was extensive -- they plugged the hell out of it in TV, in magazines, in whatever venue they could, and I'd say it was clearly effective. Nintendo simply has not done that. The shop channel being on the front of the console's homespace is hardly the same thing at all. Or look at something like imports. That's been severely underutilized (I'm not touching the idea of charging extra money for no modifications whatsoever, because that's too pathetic to comment on), but even so, there was very little pushing done to alter people who don't check daily PRs about the existence of these import retro games that have never seen US release.
TV advertising would be great given the number of people out there that, I'm sure, would be into the idea of so much retro gaming concentrated in one machine. It was one of the things that sold me on the Wii, and I know I'm not alone in terms of people who would look at a TV ad featuring Sonic, Link, Mario, Starfox, Simon, Ness, Samus, Ecco, or a dozen other iconic characters and say hey, this looks really appealing. But even setting that aside, there's a massive amount that Nintendo could be doing to just advertise the Virtual Console to its existing userbase. They have nothing like the 360 dashboard featuring, essentially, ads for new games. There are no demos, no news releases (despite their mini-email system) letting people know about new games, no fancy imagery -- nothing whatsoever. Are they doing anything to build hype for certain games? Giving people a heads' up about what's coming, or allowing user/community input on games, or any of quite a few other things that could be done? It's all really quite pathetic.
The fact that they won't even address the storage problem aside from mocking the few people actually buying Virtual Console games speaks volumes alone.
CreatureX3 said:
No. People are interpreting a decrease in third party interest by way of: the decreasing number of weekly releases (which is easily more attributable to Nintendo, but it still, quite obviously, impacts third parties); the decreasing percentage of releases being third party titles; the decreasing prominence/quality of third party releases (or, hell, releases in general); the meager offerings of the new systems that have launched on the service (C64, SMS, NeoGeo)... on and on and on, actually. Hell, even look at Hudson and Sega. They used to be absolutely huge in the VC releases. Compare their current output with what we were getting a few months ago and it's striking.
Short answer:neight said:
Over ten million isn't enough when there are over twenty million Wiis out there and the standard Wii Points denomination of 2000 will always be able to afford a minimum two games, in every possible use of 2000 points not involving picking up both Sin and Punishment and the Internet Channel (which has got to be among the rarest buying combination out there). More worrying, every time we've heard VC sales figures, it's always been roughly one VC game being sold for every two Wiis, which shouldn't be the case. The tie ratio should be increasing as the Wii has been on shelves longer, much like it does for basically every other system everywhere.
Long answer:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=9664218&postcount=18025
I will say: I'm entirely open to being disproven. (I'd even probably be happy if someone could prove to me why these numbers should be looked at in a very positive light.) Haven't seen it happen yet, though, and that post's been there for a month.
neight said:
Are you going to address any of the substantive points being made, or just keep offering up snitty one-liners?
And I don't think the expectations are unrealistic. Given the success of digital distribution or retro gaming services like Steam, GameTap, or XBLA, there's a market there. Given the astronomical success Nintendo saw with the NES Classics line on GBA, there's a market for that stuff. There are a lot of older gamers out there that are interested in this sort of thing.
On Nov. Nintendo reported $33 million worth of downloads on VC which they called 'not bad figures'. I think some of you people have to keep things in perspective. People buy a Wii to play Wii games, not to use it as a VC box. Especially with the casual success of the Wii how many of them do you think are going to bother with connecting their console online or even to buy more than a couple Wii games.ethelred said:
neight said:
Well, you're right; clearly an impossible situation, so it makes sense that Nintendo has made zero conceivable effort to rope in additional retro-gamers or to sell current Wii owners on VC. And so obviously we should all be perfectly content with this zero conceivable effort as Nintendo reports that the results are "not bad" while ratcheting the quality of the service downward week after week.
Everything's happy in Candyland.
As for the quality of games released. Once again keep things in perspective. While to the hardcore like us we know what the gems are to most people games are just games. IMO the games being released on VC lately aren't that bad some of them have enticed me if I had the extra money I would certainly give some of them a try. I mean DoReMi was released last month do you expect a gem every week?
neight said:
neight said:
Why are you framing every response in some twisted little hardcore/casual dichotomy? Your arguments are also incoherent -- you defend poor VC sales by saying that the casual gamers aren't buying the Wii for Virtual Console games and most of them can't even be expected to make their machine go online, before seguing into a defense of mediocrity because the games being released are just the sort of thing casual gamers would love! Why yes, I can see them going positively nuts over Bases Loaded.
Sorry about that I realized the hardcore/casual thing when I made my last post. I guess I'm just confounded by your people's expectations which hit me out of nowhere so I'm trying to come up with reasons to counter them. But in the end if Nintendo is okay with the VC's success that's all that matters and not what you people think and not how I'm trying to rationlize the VC's 'humble' success.ethelred said:
I still contest the whole mediocrity thing. The games being released aren't that bad, Wonder Boy was just released last week which is a good platformer. And DoReMi was released last month do you expect a gem every week?
About the ads thing I guess it's a matter of how much reward they will get out of a $5-10million marketing campaign. IMO the kind of people that would be interested in purchasing on VC will find it just by connecting their console online and exploring the Shop Channel themselves or by learning about it on forums and word of mouth.
ethelred said:
Bingo. You don't know how many people (mostly lapsed gamers) I told who had no idea of the VC and whose interest in the Wii skyrocketed once they were told of it.
Them: "Wait, you can download Mario Kart AND Sonic 3"?
Me: "Yup"
Them: "How much?"
Me: "Between 6-10 dollars"
Them- "WOW THAT'S CHEAP"
The point is that they shouldn't be content with "not bad."neight said:
...And was already on VC.
Right about now we're lucky when we get a moderately good game every two weeks. There's no excuse for this when Japan has many games that either already have translations or wouldn't need much of anything, such as Pulseman, Final Soldier, Warsong, Gleylancer, Panel de Pon, Fantasy Zone, and Ys Book I & II, and Europe (which is admittedly even more shafted than NA in terms of VC releases) has Vectorman, Mega Man, and Mega Man 2 among others.
Some of those games are on their way to NA eventually, of course, but the point is that there could be one good VC game--not necessarily a gem, but at least one good game--per week for the next three months just on the strength of a back catalog of titles that already released in Japan or Europe--titles that, in other words, are already entirely ready to play on Wii. Expecting that isn't unreasonable.
Yes, precisely this as well.BorkBork said:
There is a clear correlation between the 4 major VC parties concerning releases. These parties are of course Nintendo, Sega, Hudson and D4 Enterprises. Typically 1 game was chosen per publisher per week while the smaller guys were randomly rotated in every few weeks with priority given to larger publishers with more games. If you look at the distribution Nintendo, Hudson and Sega have almost the same amount of games on the service.
The problem here is that Sega has been slow on getting SMS games up, while Hudson and D4 have taken a break from their respective consoles leaving gaps in the lineup. As far as I can tell each publisher is responsable for the content on their system.
The problem here is that Sega has been slow on getting SMS games up, while Hudson and D4 have taken a break from their respective consoles leaving gaps in the lineup. As far as I can tell each publisher is responsable for the content on their system.
JoshuaJSlone
Member
*shrug* There aren't new retail releases I'm willing to purchase every week for every system either, but that's not so worrisome if there's a large catalog to pick from.ethelred said:
JoshuaJSlone said:
Well, that's jolly good for you, isn't it? It still has nothing to do with what the conversation was about -- the continuing quality of the service, its continual ability to live up to its potential, and the worth of its new releases -- so it wasn't relevant when the last guy said it and it isn't when you've said it. If you can freeze the Virtual Console's library in time and live off that, great; I can't, others can't, and many people buy the games when they come out if they have any intention of doing so.
Jokeropia said:
Why don't you tell me? That way we can get whatever your spin will be out of the way with first.
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
ME ME ME! 
Shining Force would be great!
Shining Force would be great!-It's not about whether VC already has a great, substantial library, but whether it could have an even better one.JoshuaJSlone said:
-Retail releases of new games require much more work than digital releases of already-existing games; expectations should be higher.
-I don't see having a large back catalog as a sufficient excuse for a lack of games being released in the present. On any system.
A Black Falcon
Member
neight said:
Current guess? Never.
I've said it before and I'll say it again... my issue with the ever-dwindling quality and quantity of VC releases is that it's a classic Nintendo pattern. Announce something, hype it a little, don't see the expected numbers, scale it back, numbers get worse, bail out.
I see VC's future possibly mirroring that of 64DD, VB, e-Reader, GBA->GCN Connectivity, GBm, and any other given product that Nintendo bailed on when the numbers didn't meet expectations.
Granted that's on my pessimistic days. I really honestly hope we get a lot more good games before the end of the service, and especially some of the cult hits/gems that are not guaranteed hits but also aren't guaranteed crap.
With the whole Goldeneye fiasco, I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo and MS combined ensure that none of those games ever hit VC or XBLA.
I see VC's future possibly mirroring that of 64DD, VB, e-Reader, GBA->GCN Connectivity, GBm, and any other given product that Nintendo bailed on when the numbers didn't meet expectations.
Granted that's on my pessimistic days. I really honestly hope we get a lot more good games before the end of the service, and especially some of the cult hits/gems that are not guaranteed hits but also aren't guaranteed crap.
Rare's answer: "It's possible" but nothing about probability.neight said:
With the whole Goldeneye fiasco, I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo and MS combined ensure that none of those games ever hit VC or XBLA.
SonicMegaDrive
Member
BooJoh said:
This has been my fear from the very beginning.
My *HOPE* is that it's simply a lull to entice people to purchase their latest ACTUAL games like Mario Galaxy, Smash Bros. and Mario Kart. That is a lot of major releases in a small amount of time. I can only hope that as soon as there's a really slow period of retail games coming out, the VC will pick up again.
Dude, VC is pretty much free money. I doubt the cost-reward issue is really an upsetting one for Nintendo. I think it's just that they rapidly went through most of their classic first-party game library and third-party stuff is much more difficult to come by.
Oh, and you also all have to keep in mind that for the most part anyone can play these games for free via emulation. I like that VC gives people a legal outlet to play old games but if ethelred thinks that this is the thought process of the majority of people he is being deliberately ignorant.
Oh, and you also all have to keep in mind that for the most part anyone can play these games for free via emulation. I like that VC gives people a legal outlet to play old games but if ethelred thinks that this is the thought process of the majority of people he is being deliberately ignorant.
dragonlife
Member
WHAT!? Are you serious? XD You just gave one out like that?Cyan said:Sent. Check your messages!
Yeah, Nuclear definitely sounded like he wanted it.
That's another thing. I want to play these games legally. I've been wanting to play EarthBound for years now, but I'm not about to shell out $80 for a used copy on ebay. That leaves me two options: wait for VC and pay $8 to play it legally, or download a ROM and become part of the piracy problem. That decision would be made much, much easier if the game was actually on VC. I'm sure there are many other people with the same problem with this game and others.Sharp said: